Obama's victory should be a wake-up call for Republicans

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Byron York’s recent editorial was a rare objective assessment of the 2012 elections by a conservative pundit.

Although he focused on the Latino vote, the same reasoning applies to the broader electorate.

Here is a more comprehensive list of the issues that shows why Democrats did so well with voters this year.

Overwhelming majorities of the electorate support the tax policies of the Democrats. Democratic candidates supported: ending the Bush tax cuts for those making over $250,000 (even a majority of Republicans support this), a surtax on those making over $1 million, the “Buffet rule” requiring millionaires to pay a minimum tax rate of 30 percent and have investment income taxed at the same rate as wage earnings, raising the cap on payroll (FICA) tax to make Social Security sustainable, and ending subsidies to oil and gas companies.

Republican candidates consistently supported lowering taxes on the rich (the silly, trickle-down economic approach that has never worked), supported raising the Social Security eligibility age, and opposed cutting subsidies for oil and gas companies (even though they have been making record profits) because they saw a reduction in subsidies as a “tax increase.”

And here are other issues the majority of the electorate supports. The majority wants to keep Medicare as is.

Every Republican member of the House of Representatives voted for the Paul Ryan plan that would change Medicare to a voucher — premium support — system. Republicans also want to raise the eligibility age for Medicare.

A public majority supported Obama’s Job Act that would have created over 1 million jobs through infrastructure improvement projects like highways, bridges and schools. The Republicans in Congress squelched this proposal.

Not only did Republicans lose because of the above issues but also because they alienated so many voters with their extreme positions and rhetoric.

They alienated Latino’s with their support of the harsh Arizona “papers please” immigration stance and their threat to veto any form of the Dream Act.

They alienated many women with their extreme stands on abortion. The Republican platform proposed making abortion illegal in all cases — including rape and incest; and of course, the insane take on rape — defining “forcible” rape and rape as “God’s will.”

Paul Ryan and Romney supported the “Personhood Amendment” that would make all abortions illegal and many forms of contraception. Romney wanted to defund Planned Parenthood — an organization that provides family planning counseling and primary health care including contraception, mammogram screening, etc. to millions of women.

One in three women use Planned Parenthood at some time in their lives. Lost in Republican dogma is the fact that Planned Parenthood has, through its various services, prevented more abortions than any other organization in the world.

Republicans alienated black voters (and many others) by the constant disrespectful way they have treated President Obama — calling him un-American, a communist, a Muslim, an Antichrist; challenging his legitimacy as demonstrated by the birther movement that just won’t go away.

The Republicans alienated many voters by their creation of a nonissue of voter fraud. Republican state legislatures went far beyond the facts to pass voter ID laws, purge voter registration lists, shorten voting days.

They did this to ostensibly eliminate voter fraud, but it was clear that the measures were designed to suppress votes from those who primarily vote for Democrats, particularly minorities and young people.

Some legislators were so bold — and not so bright — to boast how the measures would help ensure Romney’s victory.

Fortunately, these measures seemed to backfire since many voters were driven by their outrage at Republican tactics to suppress votes that people turned out and voted against Republican candidates.

The Republicans alienated many voters because of all the “big” secret money donors and their front organizations like American Crossroads.

The bottom line is that the Republican Party has been hijacked by radical fringe elements that do not represent the majority of Republicans or conservatives but do dominate the party’s rhetoric.

These elements threaten and openly oppose any moderate voices in the party who want to put the good of America ahead of radical agendas.

This should be a wake-up call to Republicans to stop letting the crazies dominate your party’s message.

America needs a credible, reality-based, two-party (or more) system. There is still ample room for valid compromise to help our country.

We can all help by calling our congressmen to tell them we support Obama’s tax plans to avoid the negative effects of the “fiscal cliff” in a responsible way.